The Second Time Around

There are many poems about your first love

The first person to show you what it's like to love someone outside your family.

They elicit all these new reactions and feelings out of you.

Who knew love could feel like this?

An everlasting hug from the sun, radiating warmth all over you, kissing every inch of your exposed skin.

Suddenly, it's gone.

Your heart is ripped from your chest, you feel like the earth is crumbling underneath you. You question whether the entire time, they were lying, not even truly loving you. It's truly agonizing.

You're not sure why they had to leave, but they did. And now you have to build yourself back up from the dirt again.

You swear to yourself to never give anyone the power to hurt you the way they hurt you.

You feel yourself becoming bitter, building up stone walls The Great Wall of China would envy,

And you hide.

You hide and you cry and you let yourself feel the pain of losing your first love.

Days, months, years go by. You pique the interest of someone else.

You insist they’d be better off staying away. After all, if your first love wanted nothing to do with you, why would they be any different?

That someone new decides to stay. They decide you’re worth it.

They don’t care how long it takes they just want to be given a fair chance with you.

They sit there taking apart brick by brick in order to truly see you in your rawest form.

They helped heal you with their love and their patience never faltered no matter how many times you accused them of being ingenuous. 

They stay by your side and tell you all the sweet nothings your first love told you and you can't help but feel anger at the words

"I promise to never leave you"

"My mind always wanders to you"

"You make everything feel right"

You want to believe them, you do. You want to be okay again.

One day you rise from your sheets, take a look at yourself in the bathroom mirror and realize

“Good god; I love them too”

You don’t know how but now the world feels lighter and brighter.

It’s easier to breathe and participate in the world.

You find yourself being able to cross new boundaries you couldn’t before the first time.

Being unabashedly yourself and having them accept you feels nearly as liberating as an eagle soaring through the sky.

This feels nothing like the first one.

Any of the worries you had the first time are easily dispelled. 

It feels easier. Happier. More genuine.

There are many poems about your first love.

But there aren’t nearly as much as there should be for your second one.

The person who helped you find out who you truly are, with their unrelenting support and love.

You watch other couples and can’t help but be grateful you’re not like them.

You communicate all your feelings. You are always on the same page with each other. No one oversteps any boundaries.

All the petty problems your friends run to you crying about you could never imagine being put in a situation like that with your person.

Nothing feels like it’s on the edge of being destroyed. 

It’s peaceful. 

Everyone gives the first love credit. 

But no one talks about how much easier it should get the second time around.